Omnipresent is the New Agility- All you need to Know

 Omnichannel is a word frequently used and thrown into strategic outlines’ very casually by our sales team, Bigcommerce developer and other ecommerce experts. But what does it actually mean to be omnichannel in your ecommerce business? Well, omnichannel is the new agility, you can’t claim to have an agile ecommerce strategy unless you’re omnichannel. 

You can also call it omniagile! Which means to be evolving and reevaluating your business strategies with the changing needs and demands of the customers. People often confuse multichannel and omnichannel, well there’s a very fine line to thread upon but surely has the power to change the future of your business.

What is Omnichannel and how does it translate into Being Agile?

An omnichannel business approach is giving your customers a smooth and seamless transition from one channel to another. Whether the client shops from a brick and mortar shop, laptop, mobile, tablet or PC the process should be continuous and inclusive. In fact having an omnichannel business approach has now become a necessity rather than a choice.

 Customers trust a business that can be accessed from any channel which is convenient to them. More than 73% of the customers use multiple channels in their purchase process, according to Harvard Business Review. People love to research before committing to any product even if they see it in a brick on mortar store, solidifying the fact that having a physical store doesn’t mean you don’t need an online presence.

Having an agile or omniagile approach means that the customers have the same experience on every channel or platform they go to for purchasing. The fine lines between various channels have blurred to the point that people don’t even want to waste a single moment on a site they are skeptical about. The competition is soaring high, the options are unlimited and once a customer loses its interest or trust there is no undoing it.

 make sure your online store is accessible from every possible device or touch point like email link, Google ads, mobile notification or social media posts without any difference in loading time, speed, pricing or quality. Breaking free from the barriers of different channels without breaking a sweat is the real challenge for BigCommerce developers!

Difference between Omnichannel and Multichannel

Before moving on with the strategies to become omniagile, let me clear the difference between omnichannel and multichannel in order to make things more comprehensible. Multichannel is the first step towards being omnichannel, you can’t possibly be omnichannel if you’re not multichannel. Basically multichannel means to be present on all platforms, devices and networks. 

The customers should be able to connect with you, know all about you and interact with you without any glitch. But omnichannel take all this a step further and makes sure that the customers can move from one channel to another without any trouble. If they started the purchase process from a Facebook ad they can easily end up on your online store and make the purchase, without having to open another site or close the page, search for your website and all that nuisance making the customer run away!

Strategies to become Omniagile!

For the final consumers, omnichannel is a user experience that doesn’t have any hitches in it but for the merchants, managing an omnichannel business can be a total nightmare. In order to become flexible and agile, every business needs to incorporate the following strategies to the T.

1.  Get To Know about Various Platforms Where Potential Clients Exists

The very first step towards your omnichannel strategy is to get a good know-how about the platforms, channels or devices that are already in use by your customers. You have to be on top of things like customer preferences, their dislikes and experiences with a particular platform to construct a robust strategy with your developer and have BigCommerce custom design.

 Collecting this valuable data is made quite easy with Google Analytics that provides vital information about customer behavior. After you have figured out the most in use channels you can than start working on integrating them with your business module.

2.  Work Out Strategies for both Existing and New Customers

Just like old customers are valuable for any business, gaining newer ones holds equal importance for the expansion of it. You can’t have a similar marketing strategy for all your customers so make sure to work on a detailed customer identity. You can do that by thinking about both online and offline customers, their behavior, buying habits, purchase frequency, mode of payment and the most used channel by the customers. 

Now that you have a good idea about your existing and new customers, make sure to segment them according to their preference as a whopping 74% of the customers get frustrated when they are directed to some irrelevant content during their purchasing journey.

3.  Get to know your Customers Journey

Now that you have figured out all the minute details about online, offline, current and future customers it's time to streamline all the various touchpoints and integrate them seamlessly in your business module. Make sure to closely knit the multiple channels various customers are coming from in real-time so that no goof-up, glitches or gaps ruin all your previous efforts. The best way is to step in your customers shoes and experience the whole journey yourself.

4.  Prioritize Channels and Platforms

An omnichannel business may entertain its customers on various channels but there still are some channels that bring in more customers or are preferred more by a larger sum of audience. BigCommerce developers need to figure out these channels and prioritize them. 

Sometimes emails are reaping more customers than SMS messaging other times social media is gaining more customers than in-app messaging. so invest in the right channel and make the experience better there.

Summary

In order to have an omnipresence in your business you need to make sure that your online store is mobile friendly, your technical staff is advanced, keen and dedicated, the online store is integrated fully with every touchpoint your customers love to shop from and all the customers coming from all the different platforms are equally appreciated and treated.